Question

What were some of the rights violated during Japanese Interment (United States)?

Answer 1

Over the course of Japanese-American internment, a number of constitutional rights were violated by the United States government. While these abuses were never freely admitted by the United States, or the Supreme Court, on further analysis we can conclude that the rights to the freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to assemble, and many others were violated ("Summary").

Religious rights at Japanese-American internment camps were one of the first victims of the human rights abuses. At the internment camps, the practice of the Shinto religion was outright outlawed, and Buddhism was severely restricted by the ban on Japanese written materials, which was necessary for worship ("Summary"). Overall, the practice of any Eastern religion was highly discouraged, and banned in the case of Shintoism. Denying these Japanese-Americans their right to worship the religion that their ancestors had done for thousands of years was a downright human rights disgrace. 

At the same time, the first Amendment to the United States Constitution was again violated, as Japanese-Americans were denied the guarantee of free speech while interned at the camps ("Summary"). Japanese-Americans were not allowed to speak Japanese while at public meetings, and public newspapers were not allowed to be printed in Japanese ("Summary").  In violation of the American right to petition the Government for a redress of grievances, there are many documented cases of Japanese-Americans being labeled as "troublemakers", and sent to isolation camps, who attempted to petition the government for redress ("Summary").  

Violating the fourth amendment to the United States Constitution, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), prior to Japanese-American internment, had systematically searched the houses of Japanese-Americans without search warrants, seeking any item whose origin was Japanese ("Summary"). In essence, the FBI was basing its searches of the houses of over 100,000 people on the basis of their national origin, and no evidence of disloyalty to the United States whatsoever. This was an obvious and blatant violation of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and a violation of the rights of Japanese-Americans. Simple and everyday items as common as short-wave radios that can be found in most American households were confiscated from Japanese-Americans ("Summary"). 

Perhaps the among the most grievous, the forced removal and subsequent detention of Japanese Americans resulted in the denial of witnesses in their favor, and the denial of assistance of counsel for their defense ("Summary"). Also, almost none of the 100,000 interned Japanese-Americans were given a speedy trial or access to any legal representative whatsoever upon accusations of their disloyalty to the United States ("Summary"). Finally, almost none of the Japanese-Americans were told of the crime that they had committed against the United States, as most of them had committed none ("Summary"). The 5th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was grievously violated, and Japanese-American rights were vehemently denied. 

The "assembly centers" and "detention camps" that Japanese-Americans lived in during their internment were grossly inadequate for their conditions, and completely insufficient to what they deserved ("Summary"). The hospitals in the internment camps were understaffed, medical care poor and food was dietetically deficient ("Summary"). Each of these circumstances can qualify as cruel and unusual punishments for the Japanese-Americans, a violation of the 8th Amendment. A large number of the Japanese-Americans interned were citizens of the United States. As citizens of the United States of voting age, it was their constitutional right under the 15th amendment to vote regardless of their race, color, or previous condition of servitude ("The Bill"). However, in the case of Japanese-American internment, the right to vote in public elections was denied, as the Japanese-Americans were prohibited from returning home to vote at their place of residence ("Summary"). Finally, in violation of Constitutional Amendment XIV, the equal protection of Japanese-Americans was violated because the government acted “solely on the basis of race and national ancestry” when identifying persons to be excluded from designated “military areas” along the West Coast states ("Summary'). The Japanese-Americans were deprived of their liberty when they were forcefully taken from their homes and placed in internment camps full of armed guards, weaponry, and hostile soldiers.